1. Field of Invention
The present invention relates in general to the field of computer networks and more specifically to computer networks including optical communication couplings.
2. Description of the Background Art
Optical communication links continue to present an attractive network communication coupling option within a network system—especially for relatively high speed and low cost point-to-point connections. However, monitoring such optical networks may become particularly problematic in view of recent developments.
Traditionally, network monitoring has encompassed verification or analysis of network operations, such as throughput, error rate, and so on. As with wire networks, such monitoring of optical networks is typically conducted by simply tapping into electrically available user communication traffic at a service provider server.
The World Trade Center bombing and other recent events are, however, leading to a greater willingness of several jurisdictions, e.g., the U.S. and E.U., to enact lawful intercept legislation. The lawful intercept legislation is expected to enable a law enforcement agency to stealthfully monitor certain network communications of persons subject to an applicable warrant or other legal authorization, and to further require network service providers to facilitate such legal intercept type network monitoring. Facilitating the provision of related information or processing of applicable information may also be required.
Traditional network monitoring approaches may, however, lose applicability in conjunction with facilitating legal intercept or other network monitoring especially in the case of optical networks. For example, data that may otherwise be received and monitored by a service provider server or other network component may be subject to modification, whether through tampering, side effects of the network component operation or other causes, elsewhere in the network, and thus insufficient for legal intercept purposes. Such received data may also exclude applicable data that is not received by the monitoring component. Cutting an applicable optical network data path and attaching an off-the-shelf optical splitter for connection to some monitor at some point may also be problematic. For example, assuring that the cut-in will provide sufficient monitor signal strength despite tie-in losses may require diverting 40 percent or more of an optical signal transmission. Unfortunately, the 60 percent or less optical signal level that remains for completing the transmission may be insufficient for a particular optical coupling path or may render the monitoring (e.g., legal intercept) discoverable by a monitored suspect. To make matters more difficult, a mis-connection may well result in diverting the 60 percent signal and transmitting the 40 percent signal. Worse yet, the mis-connection may result in initial, intermittent or other discontinuous transmission that may hinder discovery of the error, among other problems.
Accordingly, there is a need for optical network monitoring systems and methods that enable one or more of the above and/or other problems to be avoided.